Welcome back.

Here’s a poem written to my child, who is yet to be born. A little stream-of-consciousness but still in my normal confessional style.

I have been struggling for a long time with how I am going to approach my mental illness and trauma when parenting my child. I wrote this after a therapy session yesterday, and I think it goes some way to dealing with the issue.

Get therapy if you need it (and more of you do than will admit it, even to yourselves). It can help.

Enjoy.

Richard

 

The Tears You’ll Shed

It took six months
and a million years
for you to grow in
my heart.

Longer still before you came to be.

You haven’t yet begun to breathe,
but still…

Grown inside your mother’s womb
you kick and roll and squirm as if
to leap into the world.

Shall I tell you?

That I’ve been hurled
from end-to-end of life?

That, for all its strife,
walking on the knife’s-edge
of sanity I’ve been held together
only by my wife?

That at the edge of the abyss
I turned around once more?

Shall I tell you of
the love?

The pain?

The tears you’ll shed?

The friendships that you lose
and gain?

The nights alone in bed
with nothing but a poisoned mind
and all eternity of time?

No.

These pains are mine
and mine alone
to bear.

Bare-foot, you’ll walk into the world:
we’ll hold you tight;
guide you to the light;
keep you from the endless night
that haunts me.

A perfect match of two
imperfect souls,
we’ll be forever yours.

And in our hearts
you’ll be
forever ours.